Sen. Leticia Van de Putte, D-San Antonio (center) on the House floor on Feb. 8, 2011.
Sen. Leticia Van de Putte, D-San Antonio (center) on the House floor on Feb. 8, 2011. Bob Daemmrich

It’s been noted on the Senate floor this session that the number of female senators is at an all-time high, with eight out of a body of 31. That will soon change with the departure of San Antonio Democrat Leticia Van de Putte on or about Feb. 17.

The charts below track the number of women in the House and Senate going back to the 1995 legislative session. Note that while the Senate is at an all-time high currently, the number of women in the House hit a peak high back in 2009, with 37 members. Here’s another way, perhaps, to think about this: The Senate currently is 26 percent female, while the House in 2009 was 25 percent female.

By contrast, women make up slightly more than half the total population of the state, or 50.3 percent.

 

//

Texans need the truth. Help us report it.

Become a member. Join today.

Choose an amount or learn more about membership.

John Reynolds was the newsletters editor for the Tribune from 2013 to 2017. Prior to that, he was a reporter for Quorum Report, a non-partisan online political newsletter focusing on the ins and outs under...

Ryan Murphy worked at the Tribune from 2010 to 2019. As deputy data visuals editor, he created graphics, interactive stories and data-driven features, wrangled difficult datasets and worked on tools to...